When the World Doesn't Exist
by AliyahNCIS
Summary: Fifteen years and when they look at each other they see a stranger looking back. Is this the end to the love they once shared?


He used to kiss her deeply, now it's a peck on the cheek. She used to touch him and he'd feel it to the depths of his soul. But now they barely brush each other's skin on the way by. Once upon a time they fell asleep in each other's arms. These days they wake up on opposite sides of the bed.

He misses the days and nights when they were lost in each other and the world doesn't exist. Now it has been weeks since they even tried to have sex. It's hard to enjoy sharing your body when you barely speak to the other person. She remembers back to a time when she never tired looking at him. But she hasn't seen inside his heart for too long.

They used to laugh and tease and fight, and then make up whether it was dark or light. Lately all they've heard is the angry words, and now there's too much between them to make things right. So today she holds a card with the words "attorney" and "divorce", and he sits at his desk and slips his wedding ring off.

There is a pause. They aren't together and they haven't been partners for a long time. But somehow the moment still holds its breath for both of them and ghosts of memories past seem to beg them to give love another chance. She thinks of her life, how after fifteen years they've become strangers, but she still can't imagine even one day without him.

And he looks at the dent on his finger from where that ring sat, he hasn't taken it off since she put it there, and the skin is white from lack of sun. The permanent mark on his hand reminds him of the love they once shared, and the life they're bound together in 'until death do us part'.

So she puts down the phone and his ring goes back where it belongs. That day they decide that there's got to be more, they've got to mean more to each other than a decade and a half and a sad or bitter goodbye. He buys her flowers on the way home from work, she lights candles and puts pasta into bowls.

When he walks in the house he pulls her into his arms, and suddenly they're newlyweds again as he marks his claim on her lips. Without hesitation she kisses him back, her hands finding familiar places on his face and neck. Their fingers intertwine as if drawn by magnetic force, and they don't break eye contact the entire meal.

Later, when it's quiet, they sit down and talk about what is missing and what went wrong. The attention shared over three hours doesn't change three years of slowly slipping away from each other, but both are determined that drifting apart stops now. Tonight there's no angry words, no cold sheets between them, only the lullaby of heartbeats when two sound like one. And for the first time in forever they wake up in the middle of the bed, so close she can feel his chest rise when he breathes, and he can smell the shampoo on her hair.

It took days and weeks to undo years of messing up, but they finally made up and they swore the sex was never so good, not even when they first got married. Tony winked and said something about absence making the heart grow fonder, but Ziva didn't want to hear any words from other people, so she kissed him to shut him up and he didn't complain.

After that when Tony held her he didn't take a second for granted, and Ziva never missed a chance to look into Tony's eyes and see all the way to his heart. They kissed like teenagers on a first date, touched like one of them might disappear at any moment, and slept only when they were too tired to make love any more.

They laughed and teased and fought, but there was more laughter and flirting than any actual fighting. Every once in awhile Tony will touch his wedding ring and turn it around and think about that day when everything could've changed for the worse, but it changed for the better instead. And Ziva would look at the little brown and white card that had words written in permanent marker - services not needed, and remember how close they got to losing it all, and how she never wants to go there again.

Now Tony kisses her deeply, and loves how it feels for his wife to fit against his body. Ziva touches her husband and smirks because it makes him shiver and she knows that he's going to stare at her all day, counting the seconds until he can take her home, where they will get so lost in each other that the world won't even exist.


End file.
